


see you at the beginning

by starshift



Category: Tenet (2020)
Genre: M/M, Make-out, My Love, criptic love confession, short sad and sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:29:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26808922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starshift/pseuds/starshift
Summary: Neil says "my friend," when he really wants to say "my love." For it's been that way for years, but he doesn't want to give this truth away. Until he does.
Relationships: Neil/The Protagonist (Tenet)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 86





	see you at the beginning

**Author's Note:**

> i just watched tenet and they should've done a kiss-kiss at the end, so i'm here to fix it <3
> 
> non-beta'd, all mistakes are my own :)

Ives walks away, a third of the weapon in his hand and an untold future standing ahead. He doesn’t look back towards the other two men, although he keeps his walking pace slow and careful. 

Neil isn’t focused on him though. He keeps his attention on the dark-skinned man, the man who has no idea what they’ve been through together. The long, hard nights of strategizing and drinking bourbon, the restless afternoons where they train for future (or past) missions, and the quiet mornings where they lie together, entangled in the soft, sun dipped sheets. 

He doesn’t know about any of that. But he will, soon enough. 

“Do you really want to go in there again?” He asks, his face still and emotionless as if he doesn’t want to give away some kind of secret. 

Neil replies, smiling. “I’m the only one who could open the door in time.”

He smirks. “No one is better than you at opening doors.”

“Can you see? It’s me again. I weave a new past into the mission.” Neil begins to walk away, his face turned towards the hole he just crawled out of.

“Neil, wait!” He runs up and closes the gap between the two men, save a few feet.

“We just saved the world. We can not leave anything to chance.” Neil knows what he needs to do. It’s simple, and it’s a fact of life. It’s not a choice he can outrun. What’s happened has happened.

“But can we change something if we do something different?” His face is twisted with deep emotion and thought, his mind probably frantically searching for some kind of loophole.

“Done is done. It is an expression of confidence in the mechanisms of nature. Not an excuse for not doing something.”

He looks up into Neil’s eyes. “The destiny?”

Neil gives him a sad smile. “Call it what you will.”

“What do you call it?” He steps a foot closer.

“The reality. Let me go.”

He looks down towards the ground, unable to force himself to walk away or allow Neil to do the same. “I won’t,” he says, defiant and proud. “I can’t.”

Neil gives him that same sad smile and says nothing.

“You never told me who recruited you.”

Chuckling, Neil gazes upon the lines of his lover’s face, from the crinkle of his eyes to the deep grooves by his mouth. And those once-in-a-while under eye bags from stress and sometimes utter confusion. He loves this man so goddamn much. “Haven’t you guessed it now? You did. But not when you thought. You have a future in the past. Many years ago for me. In many years for you.”

He looks at him in astonishment, a stupid look that Neil is quite fond of. “Have you known me for years?”

“For me, this is the end of a beautiful relationship.”

“Relationship?” He asks, his eyes wide with disbelief and curiosity. 

Neil involuntarily steps a little bit closer and places his hand along the other man’s cheek. His face is rough, with the beard and all, but his skin is smooth against Neil’s palm. “You will love it. You’ll see. This whole operation is a time-squeezing maneuver.”

He smiles. “I already see, Neil. Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

Neil’s breath ghosts along the other man’s lips, hot and warm. “I don’t know. Honestly, I was a bit afraid that I would scare you off.”

He chuckled. “Scare me off? I think you have the wrong idea about who’s scary in this relationship.”

Neil laughed and nuzzled his nose against his lover’s cheek, radiating warmth and comfort. “It’s going to be beautiful. You and me. I promise.”

“I wish…” he takes a deep breath and breathes out a mix between a laugh and a sob. “I wish I didn’t know it ends like this.”

Neil tilts his face away and looks deep into the other man’s eyes. “I’m sorry, my love. But don’t worry. What’s happened has happened.” He closes the gap between their lips, pressing hard and pouring all the love and passion he collected from years of being with this man.

He presses back just as hard, wrapping his arms tight around Neil’s waist and holding their bodies tight against each other. 

Neil’s hands quickly make their way into his hair, and he pulls a bit, enjoying the moan that slips from the other man’s lips. It would be the last time he would ever hear that noise. He holds it tight to his chest and opens his mouth so his lover can slip his tongue inside and hold him even closer.

They brake apart and gasp out a few breaths, heavy and laden with want and love. 

Neil buries his face into the other man’s neck, a few moments away from shedding tears or screaming at the world for being so cruel. Maybe a bit of both would do.

He strokes Neil’s hair, shushing him with a soft voice and a comfort that Neil had missed so dearly. It was hard to be around a man who he loved and did not feel that same love in return. But now, his love was realized and returned in full.

Neil pulls away and wipes his tears with the back of his hand. He smiles and laughs a bit, both happy and sad to the point of hysteria.

All his lover can do is smile and brush a piece of hair behind Neil’s ear. “See you at the beginning?” He asks, eyes welling with tears, a tight melancholy spreading through his expression. 

Neil nods and strokes his thumb along a soft cheekbone. “See you at the beginning, my love.”

**Author's Note:**

> oh christopher nolan. thank you for making crypitc movies (which i enjoy dearly) and for creating bisexual characters. love you man <3
> 
> thank you for reading :)


End file.
